Foreign stand-in GP leaves two patients dead... but will escape British justice despite admitting manslaughter

A foreign doctor who flew in to provide out-of-hours GP care is at the centre of a police and NHS inquiry into the deaths of two patients in one day.

Daniel Ubani was working his first-ever shift in Britain after travelling from Germany to improve his 'earning capabilities'.

Exhausted after only three hours' sleep, he killed 70-year-old kidney patient David Gray by injecting him with ten times the maximum recommended dose of morphine.

Yesterday the Daily Mail learned that, hours later, an 86-year- old woman died of a heart attack after being given medication by the Nigerian-born doctor.

Despite the inquiries, however, it seems unlikely that Ubani will face British justice. He has already admitted Mr Gray's manslaughter before a German court and received a suspended sentence, meaning he cannot be tried again under the double jeopardy rule.

And the Crown Prosecution Service has already decided not to bring charges in the case of the 86-year-old woman.

The two deaths have exposed glaring flaws in the out-of-hours care system which relies on foreign doctors commuting into Britain to earn £150 an hour on evenings, weekends and bank holidays despite their beingunfamiliar with British practices and having no previous knowledge of their patients.

Many doctors travel for hours before their shift, leaving them exhausted before they even start work.

Mr Gray's son Stuart, himself a GP, said: 'After-hours care provision needs sorting out urgently. How can we allow a doctor with little experience in general practice to come over to this country and then be put straight to work?'

Ubani, who specialises in cosmetic surgery and anti-ageing medicine, has since admitted that he administered the overdose of morphine because 'he could not understand the patient'.

The two deaths happened on February 16 last year after the doctor was employed as a locum to provide out-of-hours care from a base in Suffolk. He arrived at his hotel at 4am that day, had threehours sleep and started work at 8am.


On his first day's work, he was called to the Cambridgeshire village of Manea where Mr Gray, a former senior technical manager with British Aerospace, was suffering from acute kidney pain.

Instead of administering the painkiller pethidine, Ubani injected him with the massive overdose of morphine after confusing the two drugs owing to tiredness.

Mr Gray was initially thought to be sleeping but was pronounced dead within three hours. Toxicology tests suggested he could have died within ten minutes of the injection. An inquest has yet to be held.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, his devastated family learned from police that officers had investigated the death of a second patient after Ubani was called to a care home in Ely the same day.

The 86-year-old woman died two hours after he treated her. Police investigated both cases and handed files to the Crown Prosecution Service. It recommended a manslaughter charge over the death of Mr Gray but decided against further action over the second death.

In March, the CPS issued a European Arrest Warrant to bring Ubani back to the UK to charge him with manslaughter. But two weeks later, British prosecutors were told legal action against the doctor had been started in Germany.

It remains unclear why this happened.


To the dismay of Mr Gray's family, he escaped with a nine-month suspended sentence and a £4,500 fine after admitting manslaughter in a German court. Despite his conviction he is still being allowed to practise in Witten, near Dusseldorf.

The CPS is seeking clarification from Eurojust, a go-between for European prosecutors, on why German authorities took the decision to prosecute without consulting their Britishcounterparts.

A spokesman for Cambridgeshire Police said: 'A thorough investigation was conducted into David Gray's death in conjunction with the Crown Prosecution Service.

'We had completed the complex process of obtaining arrest warrants for Europe and are disappointed that any subsequent prosecution was not allowed to reach its natural conclusion in this country.

'We did investigate the death of a woman in her 80s in an Ely care home. A post mortem revealed she had died of a heart attack. However, she had just been treated by Dr Ubani so we put a case together and put it before the CPS but no charges were brought.'

Stuart Gray, 49, a GP in Kidderminster, Worcestershire, cannot believe what happened to his late father. He said the firm which employed Ubani as a locum doctor carried out only a'scant' induction, which involved the doctor 'ticking boxes' on a form.

Dr Gray added: 'We don't think he was tired and confused, we think he was just incompetent. It is unbelievable that a doctor, even one specialising in cosmetic surgery and anti-ageing medicine, would not know what diamorphine is or how much of it was safe to be administered.

'But even if we accept what Ubani said about his physical state that day, he should have held his hands up and admitted he was too tired to work. He should not have been treating patients.'

His younger brother Rory, 44, added that Ubani was simply 'chasing the money'.

Mr Gray's partner, Lynda Bubb, who called the out-of-hours service, said yesterday: 'I want no one else to go through what we have been through. They have to work out a way this does not happen again.'

The family are considering taking civil action against Ubani, who has since been fired from the agency who hired him, Suffolk Doctors on Call.

He has also been suspended from working in Britain by the General Medical Council.

Ubani, who has been a GP in Germany for 22 years, wrote a misspelt letter to the family asking for forgiveness.

Suffolk Doctors On Call, part of a group named Take Care Now, said it has now changed its procedures.

Take Care Now chief executive David Cocks said: 'Our response has been focused on doing everything we can to ensure such a tragedy could never happen again.'

The Care Quality Commission, which acts as the health and social care watchdog for England, said it would be holding an inquiry into TCN and its provision of out-of-hours services. continues here

Related Posts by Categories